1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a multi-row crop header attachable to a forage harvester and, more particularly, it is directed to an improvement in such crop headers to enable the same to be used in harvesting down and tangled row crops, such as corn which is sometimes blown down by windstorms and the like and is sometimes difficult to harvest with conventional forage harvesters.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Headers for forage harvesters adapted to handle down and tangled row crops have been devised heretofore. These have been developed to assist particularly in the harvesting of corn where some of the corn stalks are down and bent over, extending across and entangled with stalks of an adjacent row, for example. The forwardly extending dividers of crop headers, such as those similar to corn harvesters, move between the rows and the stalks of corn which are down become draped over and along the dividers as the stalks are conveyed rearwardly along the passageways between such dividers as the stalks are positively engaged by gathering chains which have longitudinal segments thereof extending respectively along opposite sides of the passageways, said chains gripping the lower portions of the stalks after they have been cut by a cutting disk or the like, at the forward end of each passageway and the lower portions of said stalks are fed into a harvester, butt end first. When the dividers encounter down or draped-over stalks, said stalks tend to wrap around the dividers and bunch up, particularly adjacent the rear ends of the passageways of the outermost dividers which results in jamming, thereby requiring greater amounts of power than ordinarily to overcome such jamming, as well as producing an uneven feeding of the stalks to the harvester. It is not uncommon that an appreciable amount of a crop of this type is lost or damaged, as well as producing unnecessary wear upon the harvesting equipment.
One of the principal difficulties occurring in the harvesting of down and tangled crops comprises the handling of draped stalks, such as corn stalks, extending across and downward from the aforementioned dividers into configurations which is sometimes referred to as "hairpinning". In particular, the difficulty is accentuated when stalks extend in hairpin fashion across the outermost divider in a multi-row crop header because one end of such stalk engages the sides of the housing of the header and becomes bound and tangled adjacent the same. One expedient for handling this type of problem is to provide rotatable rollers, especially in the vicinity of the outer end of the frame of a header for purposes of engaging the hairpin stalks and tending to feed them toward the discharge area of the header and normally into a harvester of some type, especially those including feed rolls for forcefully feeding the crop material to a cutting and chopping head of various types. A typical example of a prior device in which rollers of the aforementioned type are employed is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,048,792, to Shriver, dated Sept. 20, 1977, the roller being associated with dividers that are not adjustable laterally as to spacing between adjacent pairs of dividers for purposes of adapting same to different row spacings of crops.
Additional patents which have attempted to alleviate the above-described difficulty comprise U.S. Pat. No. 3,338,538 to Markham, dated June 18, 1968, and U.S. Pat. No. 3,791,117 to Lawrence, dated Feb. 12, 1974. In both of these patents, however, the feed assist rollers, which are not movable in concert with the outer divider, are mounted substantially vertically and extend through the upwardly and rearwardly extending inclined shield surfaces of the outermost divider, thereby producing situations where pinching of the crop material between the edges of the openings in the shields and the ribs on the rollers can occur.
Still another patent having the same difficulty as the two patents set forth immediately above comprises U.S. Pat. No. 3,803,820 to Knapp, dated Apr. 16, 1974, in which a ribbed feed assist roller extends downwardly through an opening in the shield of the outermost dividers of a row crop harvester, thus providing such possibilities of pinching crop stalks between the edges of the openings and the ribs of the rollers.
The present invention, while utilizing rotatably-mounted feed assist rollers to overcome the difficulties previously encountered with hairpinning of stalks, nevertheless, obviates any pinching of crop material incident to utilizing such rollers and also includes other distinct advantages set forth in detail hereinafter.